The Chain Letter/Transcript

WORK IN PROGRESS; NEEDS HUMAN REVIEW

You know, I find the

toughest part of any

job around the house

is the clean-up

afterwards.

Other an the apology

to the neighbours

and the trip to

the police station.

But for most men,

watering the lawn

or taking down

the christmas lights

is drudgery enough,

without having to put

everything neatly away

when you're done.

But then the next time you

go to use any of that stuff,

there's a problem.

I'm thinkin' there's

gotta be a better way.

Put a few extra rims

on this baby.

Gave myself 120 horsepower

sidewinder.

One rim for each item

I'm trying to wind up.

That way it keeps

them all separate,

and allows me to clean up any

project in two seconds flat.

I turned the idle up

to about 2200 rpm,

that'll give me enough pop to

keep the kinks out of the hose.

Now all I have to do is reach

inside and tap her into gear.

Okay. Okay.

That's important.

Don't use a

front-wheel drive vehicle.

[ applause ]

[ cheers and applause ]

[ ♪♪♪ ]

thank you very much.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

Big, big week up

at the lodge this week.

It's the end of the month,

that's when the bills come in,

you know, the envelopes

with the windows in 'em.

Or as we call 'em,

land fill.

Oh, look at this one, eh?

Final notice.

That's good news.

I was afraid they'd

never give up.

♪ lala la lalala

lalalalalalala lala ♪

[ cheers and applause ]

don't do that, harold.

Stop it.

You know how it worries

me when you're happy.

Well, it has nothing

to do with bugging you.

I'm just really happy coz

something special arrived

in the mail today.

Well, I 'm not helpi''

you inflate it.

No, listen to this.

Listen to this.

"dear friend..."

"this letter comes

to you from someone

"who wants to pass on

the good fortune they

received from it.

"all you have to do is send

it off, without changing

any of the text,

"to 10 friends

within 24 hours

"then great things

will happen to you"!

Harold, you know

what this is?

This is a chain

letter, harold.

This is all baloney.

Chain letters are right

up there with horoscopes,

palm readers and

extended warranties.

No, it says if I don't return

it, terrible things will

happen to me.

You know, harold,

in my life I've received,

I dunno, hundreds of these

darned chain letters.

I've never ever,

ever sent one out,

and look at me.

It's time for

the possum lodge word game!

[ cheers and applause ]

today's prize is from

port asbestos video.

Good for one rental of

absolutely any madonna movie.

The rental is free,

but if you wanna bring it back,

it'll cost you

five bucks!

All right, mike,

cover your ears.

Red, you've got 30 seconds to

get mike to say this word.

Yeah, all right,

winston.

And go!

Okay, mike,

every christmas

your family gets together

because it's...

When they all get

a day pass?

No, okay, no, like my mother

makes cranberry sauce

every thanksgiving.

There must be something that

your mother does every year,

and that's called a...

Wedding?

No, okay, okay,

but your mother

does that so often

because it's one

of society's...

Legal loopholes.

Okay, but carry on

with the wedding thing.

The bride wears a white dress

because it's a...

Naive groom!

Uh, red,

almost outta time.

Okay, okay, mike, you know

these ceos that make their

big money grab,

and they head up off to the

grand cayman, okay,

that's because

for them it's a...

It's a criminal's paradise.

How do you figure that?

No extradition treaty!

I heard it! I heard it!

Welcome to the experts

portion of the programme

where we address

those three little words

that men find

so hard to say...

Audience: I don't know!

Okay, here's the letter...

"dear experts,

my question is,

"should I heat my house

with gas or electricity?

"now that the nights

are getting cooler,

"what's better for sleeping,

oh, no no no.

Electric blankets scare me.

Well, they're okay,

unless they get wet.

You know, in prison they

keep the temperature

at 70° fahrenheit.

All day, every day.

It's kinda like california.

Except with no

beaches or palm trees.

Or movie stars.

Oh you'd be surprised.

Plus in prison

you had more options.

You had gas, electric

or lethal injection.

I don't think the guy

wants to sleep that long.

Personally, I'd recommend

the furnace over the

electric blanket,

because they have these

programmable thermostats now

that can be set to be constantly

adjusting the temperature

in the house.

Oh yeah, around here

they're called husbands.

There is

another option!

You know, back in the 70s there

was this rock 'n' roll group,

and they were called

three dog night.

You got any idea where

they got that name from?

A frat party?

No, no,

from australia.

Coz sometimes

they sleep with dogs.

Sure sounds like

a frat party.

You know what, forget about

gas, forget about electricity,

the cheapest way to stay

warm is just to wear

more clothes to bed.

Yeah, okay, but what

about when you wanna...

What?

You know...

You know!

Oh, I know I know,

I'm just not sure up know.

I'm talkin'

about ngggg....

I'm talkin' about

if you wanna do something...

But you have all

those clothes on...

Well, you just keep your

slippers near the edge

of the bed,

and don't take the flap down

'till you get there.

[ laughter and applause ]

a lot of people have these

central vac units in

their homes,

but I got to thinkin',

you know, something this good

shouldn't be wasted

on house cleaning.

My mind takes me back

to when I was a kid there,

used to go down to the

big eaton store in toronto,

and they had vacuum tubes

there for taking messages

from one area

to another.

Like maybe checkin'

on the price of something

or gettin' you your bill.

Or tellin' the manager

there was a 9-year-old kid

in a flannel shirt trying

to steal fishin' lures.

So this time on

handyman corner,

I'm gonna show you how to

turn your central vac

into an in-house, two-way

message delivery system.

First thing you wanna do is

re-wire the receptacle

so that it's controlled

by this wall switch.

Like this...

[ vacuum whirring ]

so that's where they go!

Next you need

a coupla mailboxes.

You can actually

get these cheap,

as long as it's dark and

you've got a strong bumper.

These are going to become

our message centres.

To hook the unit up

to the central vac system,

you need some pvc pipe,

and a coupla elbows,

and then that way anything

that's travelling through

the system

will be deflected

into the mail box.

Now, sending messages,

well, that's a little trickier.

Coz you need something that

will funnel everything

into the pipe.

I'm actually gonna use pieces

off these highway safety cones.

You can get these while you're

getting the mail boxes.

You need to get

two of these units

so that you and your wife

can each have one, see,

and then wherever you

are in the house,

you just plug it into the

nearest central vac outlet.

The only other detail is

controlling the air flow.

See, I punched a hole

in the side of the mail box.

And in the

"receive" position,

the hole is covered by

this plug that we took

out of our bath tub.

It means bernice and I

can only take showers now,

but that's fine.

I mean, the two of us

having a bath together

looks like a manatee

exhibit at marineland.

Right now I wanna send

bernice a message.

So what I do is

move my dispatch arm

into the send position.

That moves the bathtub plug

away from the hole,

and allows air to flow

into the system.

Coz air is kinda

like a married man,

it'll always take the

path of least resistance.

Okay, bernice is upstairs

in the house somewhere.

I'm just gonna send her

this little message.

Now I just swing the arm into

the "receive" position.

[ chuckling ]

there we go.

Wonder what she said?

[ applause ]

I think I figured out

the exact moment

men started to go

horribly off-track.

It wasn't the

first superbowl

or a village people

concert

or when they introduced

bottomless drinks at

the topless bar.

It was the day somebody

invented automatic

transmission.

That changed us forever.

Suddenly, driving

a car was easy.

That's a bad thing.

Men only like two

things to be easy...

Exams and women.

And we don't study

for either one of them.

Driving needs

to be difficult.

Coz if a man is doin' something

that doesn't take both hands

and both feet,

his mind will wander,

and it doesn't stop

and ask for directions.

And if you ask me, women

would prefer to date a guy

who has standard

transmission.

Coz if he's a young man

you know he's gotta keep

his hands to himself,

and if he's an old guy,

there's less chance that

his leg will fall asleep.

So the next time

you buy a car,

get one with a clutch

and a gear shift.

Let's get back to the days

when our careers are

moving forward

and our cars

were stalling,

rather than the

other way around.

Remember,

I'm pullin' for ya;

we're all in

this together.

[ applause ]

even if you've been living a

three-ply lifestyle

on a two-ply budget,

don't skimp on your

septic maintenance.

That one place you

don't wanna be

over our head.

Well, I got a

chain letter from harold,

which is not

a big surprise.

But hey, wait a minute,

what's this?

A chain letter

from winston.

Huh? I am having a special

kind of day, aren't I?

Hey, red,

what are you doing?

You don't throw chain

letters in the garbage!

You know what,

you're right.

You know, I expected a chain

letter from harold,

but not

from you, winston.

Red, you're supposed to send

chain letters to 10

people you know.

In a town this size, you're

bound to get some overlap.

Yeah, well,

you know, winston,

I don't mind you getting

involved in this chain

letter thing.

Oh, I sense a big

'but' comin' here.

You're right.

[chuckling]

well, I was hopin'

I'd find you two here.

I've got a little chain letter

here from yours truly

to each of you.

Dalton, isn't the stamp

cheaper than you driving

all the way over here?

Yeah, but it's

not as fast.

You know what, it's not

always about money, red.

You know, red's totally

against this chain

letter thing, eh?

He feels that people

should give up all hope

of ever trying to

improve their situation.

Well, every year I look

at the fortune 500 list,

and I never see anybody

on there who made it

by sending out chain letters.

Well, that's

the way I felt,

but look what

happened to harold!

Nothing happened to harold,

he's always been like that.

No, no no.

The letter.

The chain letter!

Huh?

He sent it out like

they told him to,

and the next he got

a $100 bill in the mail.

A hundred dollars!

For nothing.

Just like that!

A hundred dollars!

I got letters to deliver,

I'll see you later.

Yeah, me too!

Red: We were trying to get

little irrigation going

out behind the lodge.

Pretty dry back there

and -- heheheh...

Sorry, walter,

sorry, sorry.

That was just an accident,

it was an accident.

So anyway --

okay, that wasn't.

That was just  --

that's just pure fun!

And then -- now, the problem

with that is now mike's

trying to keep

the box dry and so on,

gettin' a little

damp there, mike.

But mike had got one of these

underground sprinkler systems.

That's a great thing.

Meanwhile, they're trying

to get this --

but why would they

bother with the regular

sprinkler on there?

[ red chuckling ]

sorry, guys, sorry!

So we get the irrigation

and mike coiled --

and knocked walter over.

Okay, that's

not my fault.

The valve just --

I have no -- dunno what

happened there.

Guys, I think you're

diggin' her a little deep.

You only go down

about six inches there.

Boy, the ground

is so hard.

So I figure

from here on out,

we'll just, you know

what we'll do,

just kinda pile

the grass over it.

I didn't realise that

they had actually buried

quite a bit of the

pipe way down there.

But I had done my part,

and I figured why not

just relax for a minute?

And mike and walter were gonna

just go and give it a try.

Try the new sprinkler system

and see how she worked.

So they turn her on

and they're lookin' for the

little heads to pop out,

but there's

nothin' happening.

They can't quite figure

out what's going on.

But you could hear there was

water running somewhere.

And I'm starting to get a --

I'm dreaming I'm on

the titanic at this point.

And they're lookin' around

trying to feel what's going on.

Still got a problem.

They down real close there,

and all of a sudden there

they get the one head to pop up,

but it's just -- that's not --

there's where

the water is!

She's caught in

some kind of a --

boy, a kind of

a jelly thing there.

So walter decides to just

nail that with the axe,

just relieve the pressure,

and here comes the water.

And guess who got it all!

As connie francis

would say...

Who's sorry now?

[ applause ]

you know what really

frenches my fries?

Borrowing someone's car

and then finding out

it doesn't eve have

power steering!

I mean, driving's supposed

to be pleasant and relaxing.

If I wanted

a workout, I'd --

well, I wouldn't

want a workout.

But don't panic.

There's always a better way.

Get yourself one of these

heavy duty steering

wheel covers here.

Make it an extra large.

You can get these off a bus

while the driver's in

the men's room.

We're gonna slip that over

the steering wheel itself,

but you need it extra big

coz we're gonna power it

with this cordless drill.

Okay, the key here is the ratio

between the diameter of the

steering wheel

and the size of the pulley

that's going into the

chuck of the drill.

I figure 500 to 1

is the correct ratio.

So if the steering

wheel is 17 inches,

all we have to do is

divide that by 500...

You know, mathematical

formulas might be fine

for some people,

but I prefer

trial and error.

Even though sometimes it

leads to trial by fire.

And occasionally

trial by jury.

All I did was try a

bunch of different things

and stuck 'em into

the chuck of the drill.

For example, tried a baby

carriage wheel... Too big.

Went with a screw nail...

Too small.

What I am going with

is a gherkin pickle.

This baby works

like a charm.

Check this out.

What's that you say?

What if I wanna turn

the other way?

Well, hey, this is

a reversing drill.

[ applause ]

well, the whole lodge

is really getting behind

this chain letter thing.

This is the

incoming pile.

Not too excited about that.

It's the letters going

out that we're focussing on.

Get the lead outta there,

dalton, eh,

I'm tryin' to make the

5 o'clock mail pick-up.

And rather than pitch in,

you've chosen to use

harsh words?

Well, where am I,

at home?

Winston: Yeah, c'mon,

red, help out here.

I've got so much glue

on my t-t-tongue

I can't even...

Talk?

More chain letters!

Where should I put them?

Garbage can.

Oh, it's under

the pile.

Oh.

I owe you guys

an apology.

I should never have dragged

you into this stupid

chain letter.

Oh, don't be cute,

harold.

We all know about

your little windfall.

Oh, that.

Well, I took some

bean-o, I think it

pretty much took care --

no, no, no.

No, no, no,

the m-m-m --

money you got

in the m-mm--

mail.

I didn't get any

money in the mail.

The $100 bill, harold.

I didn't get

a hundred --

I didn't get $100 bill,

I got a bill for $100!

Overdue library books.

I hope you're not

gonna ask us for the money.

No! I always expect

something like this,

so I always put a little

bit of money away each

week in my cashbox.

Oh boy.

Uh-oh.

Okay,

we better go.

Uncle red!

Yes, harold?

Do you have an explanation

I'm expected to believe?

Yes, yes, I do,

harold.

You know, how you

started the whole

chain letter thing,

which I believe introduced

the concept of getting

something for nothing.

And that was just

a slippery slope for us

taking money outta your

cash box to cover our

costs here.

So in a way,

this is your fault.

Okay, okay,

don't worry about it.

I'll pay you back.

I'll pay you back.

In cash?!

Well, cash

is government

currency, right?

Yes, it is!

Heheheh,

so are stamps!

[ possum squealing ]

meeting time.

Meeting time.

Away you go.

I think we're even.

So if my wife is watching,

I'll be coming straight

home after the meeting.

I had a little lesson today,

namely that you don't need a

chain letter to get lucky,

but again

that's you're call.

And to the rest of you,

thanks for watching.

On behalf of

myself and harold

and the whole gang up

here at possum lodge,

keep your stick on the ice.

[ cheers and applause ]

sit down, have a seat.

Meeting's coming to order,

sit down.

Sit down. Everybody sit down.

All rise!

Quando omni flunkus moritati.

Red: Sit down.

Bow your heads

for the mans's prayer.

I'm a man,

but I can change,

if I have to... I guess.

All right, men, this whole

chain letter fiasco

has pointed out that we have

a real small gene pool

in our area.

And we gotta warn

the young people

that if your girlfriend

looks like you,

there's a pretty good chance

that you're each giving

the same gift to the

same guy on father's day.

[ ♪ ]